One Monk's Journey Through Faith

[This is completely tongue-in-cheek, but it wouldn't surprise me if everyone who had ever argued with me had read such a guide before]

Pacifists. We all know them. Those naive head-in-the-clouds idealists who say that Jesus was a hippie and refused war. What should you do when confronted by one? Do you have a pacifist contingency plan? Recent studies show that your chances of encountering a pacifist are greater than your chance of a zombie apocalypse by at least three-to-one. Lucky for you, I'm willing to share my contingency plan.

1. Use a long run-on sentence giving the military history of your entire family. Nothing shows your nationalistic pride like doing this. Give them the most important and emotional argument there is.

2. Remind pacifists that your family members died so they could speak freely -- and then tell them to stop speaking their minds, because it's disrespectful.

3. Cowards. Enough said.

4. Quote the Armor of God passage as if it legitimizes using a sword of steel. Make sure you also launch into an explanation about how "our struggle is not against flesh and blood" shows that physical warfare, i.e. "our struggle," achieves spiritual success as well as fighting flesh and blood.

5. Quote Romans 13 as if it means we should go to war and help other countries rebel against oppressive governments. I can't emphasize this one enough, people! Romans 13:1-7 clearly says that we are to be good and obedient citizens. Yes, it says this with specific regard to tax evasion and policing matters, but obviously we are not good and obedient citizens of the USA unless we teach other countries to rebel.

6. Remind your ignorant hippie opponent that Jesus spoke to a centurion -- and in Luke, the centurion was praised highly. Clearly, there was nothing ironic or out-of-the-ordinary about Jesus speaking to Romans. Romans were his best friends. The crucifixion was just a lovers' quarrel.

7. Make vague reference to the entire Old Testament. Duh. There's warfare there. God obviously wanted war from the beginning, or else He would have just made Eve.

8. Speak very emphatically about the biblical virtue of democracy, and how Christ died to bring us that freedom. "The truth shall set you free" is a good starting place here.

9. Jesus told his disciples to carry swords, so quite obviously his policy allowed for military action. Yeah. Beat that.

10. Quote Ecclesiastes 2. There is a time for everything. God obviously made war, peace, love, hate, death, life, baby-making, and not-baby-making. Clearly, these are all OK in God's eyes.